But I cannot seem to be able to turn the negative emotions about a very heartbreaking situation into positive emotions. Maybe it's still too soon, or maybe I just need to practice more. I can visualize all of the things you all suggested, I just cannot make myself feel them... and it's all in the feelings, isnt it? Am I just wasting my time if I cant make myself feel anything but distant with her?

you know inspite of the secret everything has a due process. anger and grief has a due process that u have to work thru the stages. so yes it is too soon. and of course the tough ones are the hardest.

but you are already off to a great start. you can visualise all that has been suggested. yes in the beginning it feels false. it feels that u r only paying lip service. but keep at it. and the feelings will come. it may come slowly. it may happen overnight. but just keep being open.

you know that's why affirmations does not always belong to the spiritual realm. most medical organisations are stressing on affirmations for inner confidence and healing - esp. terminal disease.

can u recall from ur childhood where u went against what you felt and went with the major decision. even with little things where u convinced urself the other option was correct and to this day u cant tell which way u originally felt. the mind is a v. powerful machine. and it will believe whatever u keep telling it. i mean children who are verbally abused. its because those words are repeated day in and day out do they believe them.

i am so sorry u have so many hard issues to deal with. HUGS. but believe in urself. and you will be able to pull urself out of the negative into the positive.

I just want to share a synchrodestiny moment with you all: I went to the post office to pick up a parcel and recognized one of the women behind the counter as having helped me before. She recognized me too and when she looked at my ID, she noted that I am the exact same age as her daughter whose kids are the same age as mine. Then she looked at my parcel (some Usana stuff I was picking up for a friend) she said "Oh so you must know about the Secret!" and I said, "yes, I LIVE the Secret!" (I still don't know the connection between Usana and the Secret because I am not really a Usana customer...). We then had a brief exchange talking about how the Secret is everywhere. When I was leaving, she told me to "have a most AWESOME day."

It was so cool. A total stranger many years my senior and I just "vibed" together. It almost makes me giddy thinking how FUN life is when we start using LoA!

I think the greatest tragedy would be living until old age and never realizing this had been under our noses the whole time....

I've been wondering about the power or non-positive, or rather, realisitic, thinking. For instance, if your pet is sick, and you and your partner are making plans on how to deal with it dying (how to tell the kids, where to bury it, ect) are you actually sending "let it die" signals to the universe? Is it okay to discuss worse possible scenarios but also think positively, or does thinking about the worst make it more possible that the worse will happen? It just seems like avoiding the possibility of bad things happening feels like sticking my head in the sand...

I don't think you can control whether or not your pet (or anyone else) dies. You are in charge of your own energy, and your pet is in charge of hers. So she will make the decision around her own departure time. Perhaps your pet is there to help teach your family some lessons around death, so that is a gift to you. I don't feel that discussing her death and how you will deal with it - which is a natural process, and therefore not inherently negative - is something you would need to avoid. But feeling overly negative about the event is probably not good for your own energy, so thinking of it in loving terms is certainly going to be better for you.

I think this example is different than discussion around 'bad things' in general. There are perhaps some things that people believe that they would be better off sticking their heads in the sand over. E.g. Focusing on the idea that people get robbed, and deciding that I should be prepared for it to happen to me. Probably a sure way to attract that to myself, so I'd prefer to not send any attention to the matter at all.

I agree. We have to remember that every person/being has free will, so we cannot control or change another person.

I think applying the secret/loa to a death would mean that you would attract peace and love and healing to the process of grieving. You can look for the positives and attract more of that into your life. Celebrations of life and finding the gifts in that life and/or their death is a way to positively attract more gifts into your life.

I have seen sometimes how people lose someone and stay in despair for years. I believe they keep attracting loss and despair into their lives allowing them to stay stuck there for awhile.

There's a great exercise in Ask and it is Given that talks about moving from grieving to joy, using the death of a loved one as an example. They discuss how you can move through that (or any) process by simply reaching for a slightly better emotion than the one where you are currently vibrating. They suggest that by moving through one emotion a day, you can reach a place of feeling joy and appreciation in 22 days.

I just introduced my friend to the Secret and she is so enthusiastic! She asked me if there were any workbooks to practice with. I know they've been mentioned here. Could anyone remind me of what they are and give me some recommendations to pass along?

My mom is a self proclaimed "inherently negative person". She always has been. Even in pics of her from babyhood/childhood she just looks grumpy. She even had "Wench" as her license plate one time.

When I watched The Secret all I could think about was my mom! This movie was made for her! I was so excited to tell hear about it, but when I did, she was completely negative about it. Go figure! I'm getting her the DVD for Christmas because I feel it is my duty to make her watch it!

She's very entrepreneurial and has had so many great ideas and has started so many businesses, every one of which failed, and she chalks up all of her failures to her "bad karma". She's convinced that she can't succeed at anything and that her past failures are proof of this.

She has decided to re-open a store that she once had (and failed at-due to bad location and maybe even her bad vibes). I am being VERY positive about it and rather than using the term "if" the store re-opens, I'm using the term "When" the store re-opens. I want her to do the same. I almost don't even see the point in her trying this, with her negative attitude. It's destined to fail if she goes into it with all of this negative energy.

No matter how positive I am about it, it is HER store. I am a big part of it, but bottom line is, it's hers.

My mom is a self proclaimed "inherently negative person". She always has been. Even in pics of her from babyhood/childhood she just looks grumpy. She even had "Wench" as her license plate one time.

When I watched The Secret all I could think about was my mom! This movie was made for her! I was so excited to tell hear about it, but when I did, she was completely negative about it. Go figure! I'm getting her the DVD for Christmas because I feel it is my duty to make her watch it!

She's very entrepreneurial and has had so many great ideas and has started so many businesses, every one of which failed, and she chalks up all of her failures to her "bad karma". She's convinced that she can't succeed at anything and that her past failures are proof of this.

She has decided to re-open a store that she once had (and failed at-due to bad location and maybe even her bad vibes). I am being VERY positive about it and rather than using the term "if" the store re-opens, I'm using the term "When" the store re-opens. I want her to do the same. I almost don't even see the point in her trying this, with her negative attitude. It's destined to fail if she goes into it with all of this negative energy.

No matter how positive I am about it, it is HER store. I am a big part of it, but bottom line is, it's hers.

I REALLY hope The Secret can change her way of thinking.

Oh, I hope it does too. All you can do is offer it up to her. Make sure she watches it. Remain as positive as you can. When she goes down negative roads ..either offer a positive spin or switch the subject. With people in my life who are like your mom I either give an uplifting potential..or I switch the subject entirely or get off the phone. Leaving them with their negative thoughts has created some interesting results in my world.

Bethany, I have also sent the Secret to negative people in my life. I too feel it is my "duty" to expose them to it. I might lose a few of these friends if they feel I am kicking them while they are down, but its a risk I am willing to take.

I read a quotation in a fantasy novel once that has stuck with me: "You can never fight another (wo)man's battle, especially when it is between themself and their own soul..."

The person might not be ready to hear the message. I think we have to let go of expecting any outcome. But offer it to them as information in a loving spirit. I always think if they donate it, it might end up in someone else's hands and do some good, KWIM?

Take the time to heal from your marriage before you move on with someone else. Make a list of all the qualities you would like in a new partner and then work on growing that way yourself. ~mandib50

I just introduced my friend to the Secret and she is so enthusiastic! She asked me if there were any workbooks to practice with. I know they've been mentioned here. Could anyone remind me of what they are and give me some recommendations to pass along?

Thanks!

Guess what i'm doing as my workbook?!!

i've been working on a miral(sp?) on my upstairs hallway wall...

it is a ladder from floor to cieling. on each step are the words

success

conscious

action

manifest

thought

now

balance

beside the ladder is a large vine that wraps itself around the ladder. on the vine i will have affirmations written. the vine also wraps around 2 circles...one is a mandalah. the other is called a -------- i can't remember now!!! It's used in some religions...it's like a maze...some you walk through as a meditation...some you can hold in your hand and your finger follows the path...going round and round????(someone help me out here!)

Anyway, I'm just on the painting phase right now. I am a very visual learner so this is an ideal tool for me.

I wrote on my kitchen wall. It says

I am a perfect being,
Created to be healthy.

And on my kitchen door leading to my porch/laundry room it says

Be
great - full
grateful.

And I am.
grateful.
for everything.
Especially this thread and all you beautiful wonderful people.
I love you.

I have a question. Have any of you healed around the issues of body image/weight/eating/healthy vs. junk vs. comfort food?

This is something that I need to place some attention on. The trouble is I get a lot of comfort and pleasure from eating junk. Other times I eat healthy food but feel I'm denying myself pleasure. I don't know if I should trick myself into thinking healthy food is comforting, or try to emulate people who eat whatever they want and still are a healthy weight and somehow just seem in balance about it all.

Anyone else worked on this kind of issue? It seems so complicated and it was very complicated in my family I grew up in. Lots of food issues!

Take the time to heal from your marriage before you move on with someone else. Make a list of all the qualities you would like in a new partner and then work on growing that way yourself. ~mandib50

I think, for me, it was the positive determination to be thin and in shape, which led me to the nutritional resources to acheive it. So, the belief of who I knew I wanted to be - picturing myself thin, feeling how good it feels - opened the doors to learn what to do to be thin (and it didn't involve denyiong myself junk ... as I ate better and gave my body what it needed and I no longer craved junk).

the other is called a -------- i can't remember now!!! It's used in some religions...it's like a maze...some you walk through as a meditation...some you can hold in your hand and your finger follows the path...going round and round????(someone help me out here!)

momtwice with me i didnt want to just change. i wanted to do a life change. u know something that is not momentary. because i have tried before and i have always failed.

most of my food issues are over self worth and loving myself. u know like oh poor me. here, no one wants to give u a hug so lets dig into the icecream. forcing myself didnt do it. so i started loving myself. standing up more for myself. doing little things for myself. like taking a long bath. like deciding my dd wants to watch tv but i really, really want to go for a walk. insted of ignoring my feeling i work out something so my dd wants to go too. so we go for a walk and a trip to the park.

i allow myself to write in my journal. i allow myself to let the house be trashy for a while. so i take care of myself.

and u know what my cravings have gone down a lot. my last craving was for coke. everytime i craved it i'd tell myself oh just a minute. i would get myeslf involved in doing something i like. i'd push myself a little bit so that i would forget about it. today i no longer crave coke all the time. but when i do i treat it as a gift to myself. as a once in a while treat for doing so good.

but i have visualised too. and done some work too. for instance i have visualised what my healthy foods are and how they taste. to such an extent that i can taste them. then i set myself up with a challenge. to eat an apple everyday adn do nothing else. sometimes teh only time i got was at midnight. but i would eat this apple and totally feel and eat every single bite. i also did it with broccoli and mizithra cheese. i would savour every single bite till it was all gone. i was not much of an apple or broccoli fan. just liked how easy it was.

well today i love apple and broccoli. it is in teh same category as icecream and candy is for my dd. it is a treat to myself.

the thing here is i have not cut out junk food completely from my diet. i dont crave it anymore. but when i want some i do get it.

it has taken me almost this whole year to get to where i am comfortable with food nowadays. i do make it a point to do something for myself - however small it is for myself. u know random acts of kindness for myself. becuase i need it too from myself.

I have a question. Have any of you healed around the issues of body image/weight/eating/healthy vs. junk vs. comfort food?

This is something that I need to place some attention on. The trouble is I get a lot of comfort and pleasure from eating junk. Other times I eat healthy food but feel I'm denying myself pleasure. I don't know if I should trick myself into thinking healthy food is comforting, or try to emulate people who eat whatever they want and still are a healthy weight and somehow just seem in balance about it all.

Anyone else worked on this kind of issue? It seems so complicated and it was very complicated in my family I grew up in. Lots of food issues!

I gained more weight in my life between 02 and 05. It was a new experience for me..not a great one by the way but anyway, it took awhile for me to get in THE SECRET headspace for losing weight. But I did. I started visualizing myself as a thin person which is seriously just remembering my old self...anyway, I started to make choices as a thin person. I found a great diet guru but again, that is me.. others may have other choices in front of them..it does not matter once you go to inner thin person the options show up... anyway, I've lost weight every week since september.

I have a question. Have any of you healed around the issues of body image/weight/eating/healthy vs. junk vs. comfort food?

This is something that I need to place some attention on. The trouble is I get a lot of comfort and pleasure from eating junk. Other times I eat healthy food but feel I'm denying myself pleasure. I don't know if I should trick myself into thinking healthy food is comforting, or try to emulate people who eat whatever they want and still are a healthy weight and somehow just seem in balance about it all.

Anyone else worked on this kind of issue? It seems so complicated and it was very complicated in my family I grew up in. Lots of food issues!

I'm one of those people who maintains my weight very easily. I think the key, at least for me, is that I don't feel guilty about what I eat. If I want to eat a bunch of cookies I do and I don't feel guilty about it. I also really enjoy well cooked healthy food.

I feel lucky to have grown up the way I did in regards to food. I think you may have to confront your food issues and figure out where they come from. I know my husband finds it very hard to leave food on his plate, becuase of his childhood. His family will load their plates up and then feel that they have to eat everything on it. In my family we always took smaller portions knowing that we could go back for more if we were still hungry.

I'm a vegetarian and I have wanted to cut dairy out of my diet, but never had the will to do it. I also wanted to expand on the foods I ate, eating a better variety, but always fell back on the things I was used to. Well LOA stepped in for me. When my son was born it became evident very quickly that I could have no dairy. So for the past 7 months I have been dairy free and trying more foods. I'm really happy about it. I have decided that I still love cheese and that when ds has grown out of this or is done nursing, I will reintroduce it. But it doesn't have to be the huge staple of my diet that it was.

Comfort foods have more to do with how you're feeling about yourself or your life than the actual food. If you visualize yourself feeling happy and fulfilled, I'll bet the amount of 'comfort food' you want drops significantly.

I just introduced my friend to the Secret and she is so enthusiastic! She asked me if there were any workbooks to practice with. I know they've been mentioned here. Could anyone remind me of what they are and give me some recommendations to pass along?

Thanks!

I honestly don't know about workbooks, but "Ask and it is Given" has 22 exercises in the last section, and they're awesome! I did a couple last night and wow, it felt so good!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tracy

Oh, I hope it does too. All you can do is offer it up to her. Make sure she watches it. Remain as positive as you can. When she goes down negative roads ..either offer a positive spin or switch the subject. With people in my life who are like your mom I either give an uplifting potential..or I switch the subject entirely or get off the phone. Leaving them with their negative thoughts has created some interesting results in my world.

I had a conversation like this today. I've been posting about The Secret in my blog, and she told me that she hated it. She said that she had another friend that wrote about it, too, and that it made her nauseous and feel rage when she read anything about it. She refuses to watch it, she said it insults and offends her. Wow. I felt like she wanted to engage me in an arguement, and I'd just say positive things, and that seemed to make her more angry. She actually said that it made her angry when people talked about positive thinking. Shortly thereafter we ended the conversation and agreed not to discuss it anymore, and wow.

I am focusing now on how much I love her and what a sweet and generous and kind person she is. The Mama in me wants to heal her hurt, but I know I cannot. So I'll just focus love on her :

Quote:

Originally Posted by pinkmilk

Guess what i'm doing as my workbook?!!

i've been working on a miral(sp?) on my upstairs hallway wall...
-------- i can't remember now!!! It's used in some religions...it's like a maze...some you walk through as a meditation...some you can hold in your hand and your finger follows the path...going round and round????(someone help me out here!)

Labyrinth. What an awesome idea! We're going to be Lazure painting our new house before we move in, and I think I'm going to borrow your idea and incorporate some affirmations on the cabinets and door frames. Will you post some photyos please? I'd love to see it!

Quote:

Originally Posted by goodcents

I just got a copy of the secret to hand around. It is different than the first copy - Esther Hicks isn't in it . Its still great but I wonder what happened.

There was some discussion about this, I think even earlier in this very thread. Ah, here it is:

I honestly don't know about workbooks, but "Ask and it is Given" has 22 exercises in the last section, and they're awesome! I did a couple last night and wow, it felt so good!

I had a conversation like this today. I've been posting about The Secret in my blog, and she told me that she hated it. She said that she had another friend that wrote about it, too, and that it made her nauseous and feel rage when she read anything about it. She refuses to watch it, she said it insults and offends her. Wow. I felt like she wanted to engage me in an arguement, and I'd just say positive things, and that seemed to make her more angry. She actually said that it made her angry when people talked about positive thinking. Shortly thereafter we ended the conversation and agreed not to discuss it anymore, and wow.

I am focusing now on how much I love her and what a sweet and generous and kind person she is. The Mama in me wants to heal her hurt, but I know I cannot. So I'll just focus love on her :

Labyrinth. What an awesome idea! We're going to be Lazure painting our new house before we move in, and I think I'm going to borrow your idea and incorporate some affirmations on the cabinets and door frames. Will you post some photyos please? I'd love to see it!

There was some discussion about this, I think even earlier in this very thread. Ah, here it is:

Wow, what could possibly cause such a harsh reaction in someone? Has she ever seen the Secret before? DId you ask why she felt this way? Everyone I have talked to about it has either been intrigued, or respectfully skeptic, but never hateful about it!

Wow, what could possibly cause such a harsh reaction in someone? Has she ever seen the Secret before? DId you ask why she felt this way? Everyone I have talked to about it has either been intrigued, or respectfully skeptic, but never hateful about it!

I could be wrong, but I think that for some people it greatly offends them to hear that certain things in their life may have been brought on by their own thinking. There are some really terrible things that happen to people and I can certainly understand not wanting to think that it's your fault. I don't know, just thinking out loud I guess.

The workbook I use is AMAZING. It's called "miracle manifestation manual" - by Jaqueline Aldana. It's definitely got a big "cheese factor" which makes me a little embarrased, but I'm so much happier and centered when I do my "15-minute miracle".

Does this happen to anyone else? I sometimes have trouble not being resentful of LOA when I'm feeling negative and/or frustrated. I get these circular, negative thoughts where I 1) have a negative thought, then 2) get mad at myself for being negative, which leads me back to 1. and then on to 2. and then round and round until I'm in a total funk. :

I know it's crazy, but sometimes I feel like I'm MORE negative (which I know isn't true) just because I'm so darn aware of my own negativitiy. And so frustrated by it. Which of course doesn't help it go away. How do I accept it AND make it go away?

Case in point being our financial situation. We were expecting a real estate deal to bring us $60K and it suddenly fell through right at the end. So we've gone from being set for the next year to being completely OUT of money (save the $1000 I found on the unclaimed money site!!! Which sadly can no longer go to buying MINs downloads of the Secret). We are moving to save money, not buying Xmas presents, living off mac & cheese and just feeling sorry for ourselves. I can't bring myself to feel abundant, especially with holidays now looming, and I get so ticked that I can't find one positive thought about money when I should be working my arse off to be positive about our cashflow! HELP! : I really need to figure out how to turn this around for us.

I also feel like we're suffering 'Murphy's Law'. We accepted this money as a "done deal" in our minds which LOA would say would have made it ours, but instead it fell through quite suddenly and completely at a time we were feeling very positive about our finances. What went wrong there?

darwinphish...I TOTALLY know what you mean. I have been feeling like I'm stuck in a vortex of negativity lately and I'm all the more frustrated because I know that I am creating it and that I have the power to get out of it....and yet I'm still stuck. :

I haven't read the whole thread, so this may have been answered, but I would like to know about the online version of the movie. If I pay the $5, is that for a one time only type of viewing? STBX said he thought it was streaming video, not a download.

I ask, because I want to join the 30 day challenge thread. So I may need to purchase a DVD copy of the movie. Just wanting to know ahead of time.